The situation of violence and insecurity in the state of Chiapas is very similar to that experienced in the days prior to the Acteal massacre, perpetrated on December 22, 1997, where 45 people died and 22 were seriously injured, warned indigenous Tzotzil women from the Civil Society Organization “Las Abejas de Acteal.”
“Violence is more frequent, we hear gunshots and that fear, that pain, that memory comes back to us, it revives what we lived in 1997, it has been very difficult, because we could say that we are reliving what we already lived in 1997,” Guadalupe Vázquez Luna, a survivor of the Acteal massacre, told EFE.
At a press conference held in the town of Acteal, Chenalhó, the women and men, who carried crosses of their dead, on December 22, expressed their discomfort and indignation at the omission and the position that the president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has taken in minimizing the violence that is being experienced in Chiapas.
“We have asked (the federal government) that our children do not live what we lived, our children are living that cruel reality and all this that we are living is because the Mexican government has allowed it, how? With its impunity,” added the Tzotzil woman.
Her comment was made during a reflection on “The 15 years of the liberation of the paramilitaries and its consequences,” where they recognized that violence is very frequent in the region and therefore “it is difficult to heal the psychological wounds of the past.”
They also regretted that throughout the country and in the state of Chiapas, those who are persecuted and punished continue to be those who fight for freedom, truth and justice, and those who are criminals who kill people are forgiven, pretending that nothing is happening.
“That is why many crimes, murders, forced displacements continue to be committed, because the Government has allowed it and continues to allow it, it is getting worse,” said Vázquez Luna.
For his part, Sebastián Pérez Vázquez, member of the board of directors of “Las Abejas de Acteal,” commented that it has not been easy to live with the worry of being attacked again and seeing their aggressors free.
“Yes, in reality those who have been released from prison are already living here, neighboring and are calm, enjoying their reward, they were received with 5 hectares of land, they rebuilt their house and were pensioned,” exclaimed the man.
The indigenous people pointed out that the López Obrador government will go down in history in Chiapas as a politician who did not have the political will to create guarantees of non-repetition of a crime like the one in Acteal.
“And that allowed organized crime groups to keep the population terrorized, thus promoting the forgetting of the Acteal massacre,” said María Gómez, spokesperson for the organization.
In recent weeks, activists have expressed concern about the increase in violence and the displacement of residents that has been recorded in the region, at least in three communities: La Esperanza, San José del Carmen and San Clemente.
According to NGOs and activists, the situation is getting worse every day in the indigenous areas of the Chiapas Highlands, where it is estimated that in less than a month at least 2,000 Tzotzil indigenous people were registered as victims of forced displacement fleeing the crossfire between criminal groups fighting over the territory of Pantelhó, affecting the neighboring municipality of Chenalhó.
Source: elcomentario
